Prime Originator

"What do we do now, Leon?" Lumi asked shortly after the people disappeared into the Black Swamp. When Leon told her to be quiet, she had been so nervous that she even forgot to breathe—Oh, wait a minute…

Leon flashed Lumi a glance and took a moment to ponder. 

"We will continue to wait. After they come out, we will follow them and find out where their tribe is. We can decide on our next course of action after that."

"Hmm, alright—Eh? Is that the thing you were talking about before?" Lumi suddenly exclaimed after noticing a ghastly face appearing from behind Leon. 

"What?"

He quickly turned.

After seeing the ghastly face creepily smiling at such close proximity, his expression dropped.

"Piss off!"

 Swoosh~!

In the blink of an eye, the ghastly face was swatted with another flaming palm strike.

Just like the first ghastly face, the second one was sending blazing into nothingness. But before it disappeared, it retained the same creepy smile like it had not felt the pain of its existence burning away.

 Leon felt his hair rising at this scene. It was too bizarre. No one can endure the searing pain of their soul burning. Yet this ghastly thing felt nothing, utterly nothing. 

"Dammit, I let another one sneak up on me. Did you see how it appeared, Lumi?"

"Eh? N-N-No, it was already there by the time I noticed it." 

Lumi could not help but distance herself from Leon by a few steps. She felt some fear of Leon's flaming palm strike. There was a trace of lightning in the attack that felt way scarier than the fire.

Leon did not notice Lumi's reaction, but he would not find it odd even if he did.

 Lightning was an element of extreme Yang and contained the Power of Annihilation. Even living people are afraid of lightning, let alone spirits.

It was perfectly normal for vengeful spirits of Yin alignment like Lumi to be afraid of extreme Yang.

 Leon had his brows tightly knitted.

The ghastly face was not an illusion nor a hallucination, but it was able to bypass his detection. And not just once, but twice it did.

'Nothing under the Divine Origin Realm should be able to bypass my divine sense. For something like this to happen more than once, it cannot be a mere coincidence. This ghastly thing sure is something else, alright.'

Leon was quite confident in his divine sense. It had never failed him before. 

 And because he was confident that he did not miss anything with his divine sense, there were only a few plausible explanations he could think of.

 For instance, the ghastly faces could have spatial abilities, allowing them to warp through space and appear next to him from outside his detection range. This would explain how he was only able to sense their presence next to him after they appeared. 

But to do that, their spatial ability had to be pretty powerful. They themselves had to be pretty powerful too, but this does not seem to be the case.

At his current level, if he wanted, the range of his divine sense could reach up to 300 yards.

However, he could barely feel any energy fluctuations from the ghastly faces, nor could he see anything from the Weeping Forest.

His divine sense only reached 300 yards, but he can still see quite far with his pair of eyes. The Weeping Forest was not densely clustered together.

The fact that he found nothing meant that it should be another possibility.

It was also hard to say that ghastly faces were even sentient beings. He could not sense any will or any shred of intelligence from them. They seem like soulless dolls that only know how to smile. This might explain why they feel no pain from burning, but he was not too sure. It was only a brief glance. He needed to observe another 'live' one to be sure. 

Even so, a soulless soul makes no sense.

Leon wracked his brain, trying to figure out how these ghastly faces were appearing behind him.

"Look! It's another one, Leon!" Lumi spotted. 

Leon's eyes turned sharp and immediately created some distance between him and the ghastly face. Why do these ghastly faces like sneaking up on his back so much? It was already the third time.

Seeing that Leon did not kill the ghastly face, Lumi was about to 'eat' it instead.

"Wait, Lumi. Don't kill it just yet." Leon said in a hurry.

"Eh? Why not? I want to eat them. They kinda look delicious." 

To Lumi, the ghastly faces were just Yin energy for her to absorb. 

Leon was speechless. 

What part of a ghastly face looks delicious to you? It has the face of a person who died horribly!

Although Lumi had regained her humanity, it seems she was still a vengeful spirit in the end. 

Leon shook his head and said, "Let me observe it for a bit. It won't be too late to kill it if it attacks us."

After the ghastly face appeared, it did not attack or anything. It merely continued to smile creepily at Leon. 

"It seems this ghastly thing is only attracted to living things."

Leon swept his divine sense over it, but all he picked up was a body of Yin energy.

The ghastly face was not a 'live' spirit like Lumi. It was just the empty shell of a vengeful spirit without any sentience. 

After some time, the ghastly face descended and disappeared into the Weeping Tree's branch they were standing on.

Shortly after, Lumi exclaimed, "Ah! It's behind you again, Leon!" 

While Leon was worried about potential danger, Lumi found it fascinating. Since she was not the one being targeted, she had nothing to worry about.

Leon's eyes flickered with shock. 

He swept his divine sense over the Weeping Tree but still failed to find the ghastly face in the tree. All he picked up was rich amounts of Yin energy. 

It was brought to his attention that he had been too trusting of his divine sense. The world was full of strange and unexpected things. He could never be too sure of something.

"I was too confident in my divine sense. I have been humbled." Leon sighed. 

Time and time again, his preconception and understanding of the world were challenged. His knowledge and abilities from the Divine Realm had been useful, but it would only take him so far. 

He already understood that Gaia was nothing like the Divine Realm. A different yet more powerful set of laws seemed to govern this world. Even so, he was still surprised by each and every new discovery. 

Why was this world different from the Divine Realm? What made it different? 

He wished he had answers to these questions, but he was still too weak to seek out the truth of the world.

"What are you talking about, Leon? What is divine sense?" 

Lumi was confused.

"Never mind that. I think I have a general understanding of what these ghastly faces are now." 

"Aren't they just bodies of Yin energy?"

"Yes, and no. To be exact, these ghastly faces are bodies of Yin energy that contain a memory fragment of the Weeping Tree's victims at the time of their death."

"Normally, people with a strong mind would not be affected much by the hallucinations, but people with weak minds would fail to escape and become eternally trapped within sad dreams. They would be tormented by tragic events continuous until they receive a single ray of salvation at the end."

"But that is also when the victims are successfully lured inside the Weeping Trees and become their nutrients. In other words, the Weeping Trees eat away at people's minds and absorb nutrients from their bodies."

Leon explained.

"So, these so-called Weeping Trees basically eat people?" Lumi was startled. She looked at the trees in a different light, before returning to Leon, "Since there's only a memory fragment of the victims in these bodies of Yin energy, why do they keep appearing next to you, Leon? And aren't you afraid of becoming these tree's next victim?"

"Nah, not really. We are only on the outskirts of the forest. I would be worried if we to enter deeper into the forest, though. As for that matter…"

"...This is only my guess, but the memory fragments might have contained the victims' last wish at the time of their deaths. This is why they are drawn towards living things." 

Leon no longer paid too much attention to the ghastly faces after realizing they were harmless. The real threat came from the Weeping Trees and the Weeping Trees alone.

"Ehhh? Then that means that the victims must have broken free from their dreams at the last moment and realized their impending doom!" Lumi said in realization with wide eyes and gaping mouth.

Leon clapped his hands and praised Lumi with a smile, "That's right. That should have been the case. Lumi has gotten smarter."

"Hehe—Wait, what do you mean by smarter, Leon? Are you saying I was stupid?" Lumi pouted with her hands on her hips.

"Err… I mean, Lumi is so smart." 

Leon smiled wryly.

"Hmph!" 

Suddenly Leon's ears were perked before he hushed with a quiet but urgent tone, "Shh! Those humans are coming back!"

Although Lumi was a bit disgruntled, she nodded and tone down her volume. 

Shortly after, she raised an eyebrow and asked, "Don't you think they came back a bit too quickly? We spent 5 hours to leave the Black Swamp, but they haven't been gone for even an hour."

Leon furrowed his brows and said, "They are being chased."